You’ve no doubt heard the story of the wise man who went to the river to meditate. When he arrived, he found a group of agitated people gathered on the riverbank. As he drew closer, he saw them frantically wading into the water to rescue people from drowning. Every time they pulled someone to shore, more flailing bodies came rushing downstream, crying for help.

After watching for a moment, the wise man asked what they were doing.
“Are you blind?” one of them shouted. “Can’t you see we’re saving people from drowning? We’ve been at this for hours!”

The wise man nodded. “It’s a great thing you’re doing,” he said. “But perhaps it would be even more helpful to send some of your group upstream to find out why people are falling into the river in the first place.”

That, in a nutshell, is the point of Pope Leo’s recent apostolic exhortation Dilexi te (“I have loved you”). 

As I noted in a previous article, the heart of the pope’s message is this: caring for the poor is not merely a consequence of faith—it is a prerequisite of faith and an essential aspect of the church’s mission.

What’s happening upstream?

In my parish, I volunteer with the St. Vincent de Paul ministry. Every Tuesday morning, we sort and pack donations from the local food bank and grocery store. After an hour or two of work, we open the doors, and guests stream in to receive their weekly bags.

Every week, I can’t help but wonder what’s happening “upstream” that keeps pushing so many people into poverty.

Caring for the poor certainly includes giving food to the hungry—but it also means more than that. It means, as Pope Francis says, “fighting against the structural causes of poverty and inequality; of the lack of work, land, and housing; and of the denial of social and labor rights. It means confronting the destructive effects of the empire of money” (Address to the World Meeting of Popular Movements, cited in Dilexi te, 81).

When Pope Leo says that caring for the poor is a prerequisite of faith, he’s not only talking about distributing groceries. He’s saying that disciples of Jesus must go upstream—to uncover the forces that push people into poverty and to challenge the systems that keep them there.

When Pope Leo says that caring for the poor is a prerequisite of faith, he’s not only talking about distributing groceries. He’s saying that disciples of Jesus must go upstream—to uncover the forces that push people into poverty and to challenge the systems that keep them there.

Today’s illusions about poverty

That work is becoming harder. Since the time of the previous Pope Leo in the 1800s, global wealth has grown dramatically. Yet today’s Pope Leo warns that this wealth “is sometimes interpreted to convince us that the situation of the poor is not so serious” (Dilexi te, 13).

Quoting Pope Francis, he reminds us that wealth has increased alongside inequality and that “new forms of poverty are emerging.”

We Christians, he cautions, can easily absorb this secular attitude and conclude that poverty today isn’t so bad. But Pope Leo writes:

The poor cannot be neglected if we are to remain within the great current of the church’s life that has its source in the gospel and bears fruit in every time and place. (Dilexi te, 15)

Because we are disciples of Jesus, we must locate the present-day realities that deepen poverty and work to dismantle them. And we must form our catechumens to do the same.

Helping catechumens go upstream

Identify the key themes of Catholic social teaching

If you’re guiding catechumens in the corporal and spiritual works of mercy, you’re already grounding them in Catholic social teaching. In essence, Catholic social teaching is the gospel’s call for disciples to build a loving and just society that reflects God’s reign.

For a clear overview, see Seven Themes of Catholic Social Teaching | USCCB.

Reflect mystagogically on actions of mercy

In the apprenticeship of discipleship, seekers learn by doing—and then by reflecting. Mystagogical reflection turns their acts of mercy into lessons in how Christ is at work in the world.

• Step 1: Perform acts of mercy with your seekers. Emphasize that the first task is to listen to the stories of the poor. Remind them that the poor are “teachers of the gospel” who possess “unique insights indispensable to the church” (Dilexi te, 79, 82).
• Step 2: Invite the seekers to recall what they experienced, heard, and learned.
• Step 3: Connect their experiences to the deeper tradition of the church as expressed in Catholic social teaching. Guide them from personal charity to the church’s universal teaching on structural sin.
• Step 4: Encourage seekers to commit to concrete actions that lead to a “progressive change of outlook and morals” (OCIA 75.2) and to work actively to dismantle unjust structures.

Our role as disciples is to live in solidarity with all our brothers and sisters, pursuing peace and justice.

As the U.S. bishops remind us:

We are one human family whatever our national, racial, ethnic, economic, and ideological differences…. At the core of the virtue of solidarity is the pursuit of justice and peace. Pope Paul VI taught that if you want peace, work for justice. The gospel calls us to be peacemakers. (Seven Themes of Catholic Social Teaching, USCCB)

Standing where Christ stands

Ultimately, caring for the poor means standing with them as Christ stands with us—at the very heart of the world’s suffering and hope.

When we apprentice catechumens into this work, we are not simply teaching them to “help” others; we are forming disciples who recognize the presence of Christ where the world least expects him.

The river of human need will always flow, but disciples of Jesus are called to go upstream—to uncover the forces that cast people into poverty and to build a community shaped by mercy, justice, and love.

Join the conversation

I’d love to hear your thoughts. How is your parish helping seekers or parishioners move from acts of mercy to confronting the causes of poverty? What practices have helped you or your team “go upstream”?

Share your experiences in the comments below so we can keep learning from one another.

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